Fishing for Cormorants at Nagaragawa

Ukai — cormorant fishing — has been practiced on the Nagara River at Gifu for over thirteen centuries, its fishermen using trained birds on leashes to catch ayu sweetfish by torchlight. Koitsu captures the ritual's primal drama: torches blazing from the prow of the fishing boat, cormorants plunging into the dark water, the river surface alive with reflected fire. The practice was so celebrated that it attracted the attention of Oda Nobunaga and numerous Edo-period poets.